The present invention relates to a nonvolatile semiconductor memory device in which a variable resistive element is used that stores resistance values as data. According to the present invention, a nonvolatile semiconductor memory device using a variable resistive element is provided that realizes the page operation of continuously reading and writing a large amount of data to ensure compatibility with NAND flash memories. As a conventional electrically rewritable nonvolatile memory, flash memory is known in which memory cells having a floating gate structure are NAND- or NOR-connected to form a cell array. Further, ferroelectric memory is known as a nonvolatile memory that enables high-speed random access.
Resistance-change memory that uses a variable resistive element for the memory cell has been proposed as the technique to achieve further miniaturization of the memory cell. Known examples of the variable resistive element include: a phase-change memory element in which the resistance value is varied by the crystalline/amorphous state change of chalcogenide compounds; an MRAM element that uses resistive changes caused by the tunnel magneto-resistance effect; a polymer ferroelectric RAM (PFRAM) memory element in which a conductive polymer is used to form the resistive element; and an ReRAM element that causes a resistive change by application of electrical pulses (see JP-A-2006-344349, paragraph 0021).
The resistance-change memory is advantageous because it can use memory cells formed by the series circuit of a schottky diode and a variable resistive element instead of a transistor, and therefore can be easily laminated to provide a three-dimensional structure and achieve higher integration (see JP-A-2005-522045).
The resistance-change memory is expected to be the successor to the flash memory, because it provides faster data access than the flash memory and offers higher capacity. From this perspective, it would be possible to utilize the currently available flash memory systems if the resistance-change memory could have the operation capability of the flash memory. This will reduce the cost of replacing the flash memory with the resistance-change memory in the development of new systems.